


Deft

by Mizufae, psmithery



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Fingerfucking, Fluff, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-21
Updated: 2011-05-21
Packaged: 2017-10-19 16:09:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/202713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mizufae/pseuds/Mizufae, https://archiveofourown.org/users/psmithery/pseuds/psmithery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Merlin has useful fingers and Arthur learns to read.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deft

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kim47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kim47/gifts).



Merlin’s fingers were useful. They were always doing _something_ and they were always doing it with _precision_. They were the only part of him that wasn’t clumsy.

Years ago they had plucked herbs and folded linens and pointed emphatically at sorcerers far across clearings away from him. As time went on they mixed potions and smoothed brows and wove spells that reinforced the power and strength and reach of Camelot far more than a sword or arrow could do on its own.

But as the murderous warlords of Albion were replaced by Arthur’s lords Merlin had to spread himself thin. Arthur chafed at his own responsibilities. He longed for the days when they could leave the castle and go out riding, just the two of them, and not have to stay behind while Merlin checked up on the ever-expanding borders.

Merlin shouldn’t ever leave without Arthur by his side. It was just aggravating, having to worry about him day and night while Arthur had to see to the humdrum demands of a glorious kingdom. Yes, yes, another allotment of land to the peacekeepers in Lyndsie. Yes, fine, twelve chickens to the maid who had saved the lives of those children. Could he ride out to meet Merlin now? Or could Merlin come home?

Arthur wriggled on his throne and sighed, as quietly and secretly as he could, so his subjects would not see.

He never slept well when Merlin was away. It always seemed a bit pitiful, but his bed felt cold and empty without Merlin to sprawl in it and hog the covers. He had been gone for almost a month now, long enough that Arthur was almost used to not having him there. It was a troubling feeling.

Arthur rolled over, burying his head under the blankets. Another week, Merlin had said, when his face had rippled in Arthur’s bath three days ago. That was something he would _never_ get used to - Merlin’s face appearing in the closest body of water. He was truly indiscriminate, too. It was terribly disconcerting to have your court sorcerer’s face distorted by your erection while you were trying to have a peaceful wank in the bath. But Merlin only smirked at him and told him to carry on while he prattled about this warlock and that nest of wildren.

Another four days, provided that the roads were clear after the thaw. Arthur turned over again. The last days were always the worst. The anticipation and the frustration were nigh-unbearable. He itched to have Merlin with him, to stroke his hair and nibble his ears, to fuck each other into the furs on his bed or over the table. His own hand was a poor substitute for Merlin’s focused attentions.

He’d nearly caved and called a maid to fetch him a sleeping draught, but he always felt groggy the next morning after imbibing one.

What Arthur missed most of all, if he was being very honest with himself, was the way Merlin would drive him crazy after they’d fucked well into the night. Arthur would claim all he wanted to do was sleep, but Merlin would milk him through the afterglow with kisses and touches and prods. Sometimes, when Merlin had been doing the fucking, he would lay Arthur out face-down on the bed, making the wool and fur scratch against his over-sensitized cock, and push those deft fingers back in his body as if to clean him out, but really just to hold him as Arthur shuddered with the aftershocks.

He had tried that tonight, slicking up his fingers and teasing himself, but he was too distracted and he gave up after a couple of minutes, pulling the covers around himself to ward off the cold. That had been hours ago, and he was starting to regret not sending for a draught. He was going to feel wretched in the morning. He finally drifted off into a fretful sleep, with a pillow tucked behind him and his fingers curled in the dark furs.

He dreamed.

Images of half-remembered days, council meetings and audiences and inspections, Merlin and Leon and the maid with her chickens. He went hunting with the knights, and presided over a wedding between old Philly, the fletcher, and Gwaine’s prized chestnut stallion. He was in the bath, and it was warm and comfortable, and Arthur knew the water wouldn’t go cold because Merlin made sure of it.

And then Merlin was there with him, washing his hair and his back, except Merlin didn’t do that any more, now he was court sorcerer, so Merlin stroked his legs instead, up between his thighs like he did when he was feeling mischievous. He spread his legs wider and murmured into the mattress, because that’s where they were now, and Merlin rubbed a palm over his bottom and gave it a friendly squeeze and it was _such_ a good dream. Then those nimble fingers were wet and it was even better, so he tilted his hips up and met them as they drew circles over his entrance. They slid over it, and in the dream Arthur had already been worked open so it was good, it was smooth and easy, and he hummed contentedly as his body sucked them in.

“Hmmmmerlin,” he snuffled, twisting around for a kiss, lazy and sleepy and _since when did he have morning breath?_ Or was that Merlin? It didn’t matter, so he just rolled his hips and took Merlin’s fingers deeper.

Arthur turned his head and felt another hand card through his hair. The dream was starting to fade, though he tried to hold on, it was a really good dream, and he focused on the feeling of those fingers in him and... “Merlin?”

“Good morning, sire.”

Arthur cracked a bleary eye open. “I told you not to call me that.”

Merlin curled against him, shoving the pillow out of the way and folding himself along Arthur’s side. “Sorry - good morning, your majesty.” His arm rested awkwardly between them, long, pale fingers still working in and out.

Arthur smacked him with a slack hand. “You stink, by the way.”

“I rode for most of the night you ungrateful lout. Anyway, you have morning breath so you can’t talk.”

“Mmmno, ‘spose not.” He was too drowsy to notice the third finger at first, until he felt the cool, smooth ridge of Merlin’s ring nudge against his rim. “That’s hrmm... that’s nice, it’s really...”

Merlin’s lips brushed the shell of Arthur’s ear, the wool of his tunic scratching Arthur’s shoulder where his pyjamas had slipped down, and he brushed Arthur’s perineum with his thumb.

“Get this off,” Arthur grumbled, tugging on the tunic. Merlin sighed, pulling his fingers out, and Arthur whined at the loss. Merlin scoffed and he felt a dribble of something - oil he supposed, on his own fingers, and then Merlin was guiding them back, into the damp warmth of his own body.

“Stay there, I’ll be back in a moment.”

Arthur whined again, clenching around his fingers peevishly. It wasn’t the same. He waited impatiently in the wan morning light, listening to the rustle of clothing dropping to the floor.

“You’ve still got socks on.”

“You’re wearing a nightdress.”

“It was cold!”

Merlin chuckled and pulled Arthur’s hand away, replacing it with his own once more. “I’m sorry, I was gone for too long, I know.”

“You’re early, for once,” Arthur said, pulling Merlin’s other arm under him and kissing the tips of his fingers. He lifted himself up into a half-sitting position and pulled his linen shift over his head.

Merlin had the prudence to look bashful, “I’m rather efficient when I try,” he said, and rested his head on Arthur’s bare shoulder. “Would you like me to fuck you?”

“No, not yet. Just like this, please?” He knew it was selfish, he could feel Merlin’s erection brushing the backs of his thighs, but he wanted the slow, syrupy closeness of Merlin’s fingers in him, rather than the cleaving heat of his cock.

But obviously, Merlin wasn’t complaining, because he drove in a little harder, wrapping himself closer and holding on with a hand to Arthur’s side.

“Yes, just like... mgh,” Arthur groaned, arching his back as he bore down on Merlin’s fingers. Merlin was starting to shift behind him, rubbing his cock against his thighs. It wasn’t an urgent burn, but these were the sort of lazy, unhurried touches that he had craved for the last month.

Merlin slid his hand over Arthur’s chest, catching his nipples on the contours of his palm and tracing idle patterns in the rough blond hair. Sunlight bled through the drapes, little lines of gold carving up the floor.

“I really missed you this time,” Arthur admitted, his voice breaking as Merlin searched out all the places in him that made him shudder and lift his hips. “You were gone for- _ah_ \- for months...”

“It was barely four weeks.” Merlin nipped at his earlobe. “I did just fine without _you_...”

“You were never a good liar, you know.”

Merlin crooked his fingers. “Shut up.”

“ _Fuck_!” Arthur palmed his cock, jerking it in time with Merlin’s rocking hand, as Merlin efficiently rubbed off against him.

His hole was making fluttery spasms around Merlin’s fingers, his body buckling as Merlin rubbed his perineum with the pad of this thumb, scraping his teeth along Arthur’s shoulder blade.

Arthur came like that, with Merlin’s long, pale fingers curved inside him and his thumb pushing down gently behind his balls.

When he opened his eyes, his chambers were suffused with reds and oranges of the morning light and Merlin was panting heavily against his back. The insides of his thighs were sticky, and his sheets would need changing.

“Can’t you clean it up, just this once?” Arthur rubbed his legs together, where their come was cooling. “It’s all messy.”

Merlin sighed. “I won’t use my magic for things I can do without it.”

They had this argument almost every time Arthur had energy to talk after sex.

“You had no compunction about using it when you were my manservant. I think all of these titles are going to your head!”

“Compunction?” Merlin wrestled him over so they were facing each other. “Have you been _reading_ , Arthur?”

“Just for that I’m going back to sleep now.”

“Hmm, definitely a good plan.”

“Yes. I read about it in a book.”

Merlin grinned against his chest, hooking his leg over Arthur’s. If his eyes had been open, Arthur would have seen Merlin’s flash gold for a second, and then a warm, wet cloth was swiped between them.

Arthur pulled the covers around them both and thought privately that Merlin’s fingers were very useful indeed.


End file.
